Sanskrit metres Wiki
Plan for this site Sanskrit metrics and prosody. Texts, tables of metres, discussion, ... Why Sanskrit metres? The bulk of Sanskrit literature is in metrical verse: this includes "the poems and plays, the histories and legends, treatises on law, divinity, astronomy, mathematics, and indeed nearly all literature" (C. P. Brown). Appropriateness Kṣemendra says: Definitions * (short) vowels are , , , and (this last is a rare letter and can for all purposes be ignored in poetry). All the rest are . * A syllable (TODO: this should actually be defined clearly!) is (light) if the vowel it contains is and is followed (until the next vowel) by either no consonant, or by exactly one consonant (which is treated as part of the next syllable). * Else (i.e. if the syllable contains a (or even !) vowel, or if the vowel in the syllable is followed by a cluster of multiple consonants), the syllable is (heavy). * As the syllable's weight ( / ) is thus immediately apparent, the scansion is straightforward. When it is desired to be noted explicitly anyway, the notation used for and varies: some authors use symbols that look like U and |, some use the opposite. We shall use L''' for and '''G for . Metres All s (verses) may be classified as or : * : The weight of each syllable is regulated, * : The total weight of the line is regulated. Yati Yati / virāma. * "Sentential pause" after every hemistich (i.e. half the verse / two quarters). First one called half pause and indicated by "|", and second one called full pause indicated by "||". * "Harmonic pause", caesura, after particular syllables. Names of classes by length There are names for s of each length. For example, metres with 12 syllables in each are called metres, those with 17 are called metres, etc. See Lengths for the full list. * Usually, it is two lines of: xxxxLGGx-xxxxLGLx * But in the second half of the first (or less commonly, third) , instead of the standard LGGx ( , sometimes one also sees GGGx ( ), GLGx ( ), GLLx ( ), or LLLx ( ). There are rules on what happens in the first half of the in such a case. See next. * Specifically, there are 18 allowed patterns of the 6 interior syllables, for an odd : MY xGGGLGGx YY xLGGLGGx RY xGLGLGGx TY xGGLLGGx JY xLGLLGGx BY xGLLLGGx MR xGGGGLGx YR xLGGGLGx RR xGLGGLGx RM xGLGGGGx MB xGGGGLLx YB xLGGGLLx RB xGLGGLLx TB xGGLGLLx MN xGGGLLLx YN xLGGLLLx RN xGLGLLLx TN xGGLLLLx observation: generally the substring 'LL' is banned in the first half of the pāda? * For an even , there are 5 allowed patterns: MJ xGGGLGLx TJ xGGLLGLx YJ xLGGLGLx BJ xGLLLGLx JJ xLGLLGLx * TODO: Verify these rules with statistics. Popular metres * (CPB p.3) "The last syllable of each line, in the uniform metres, is long by rule; but in practice is free." and again on p. 9: "The last syllable in each line by rule should be long: in practice it is free: either long or short at pleasure". * (Chandovallari p. 9) "At the end of a quarter a short syllable can be considered as long and a long syllable can be considered short as per the requirement of the chanda." Understanding and related metres seems a big challenge. is two halves of 8 groups of 4 s each: 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 (= 12 + 20 = 32) 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 (= 12 + 20 = 32) is two halves of 8 groups of 4 s, except that * the 6th group in the 2nd half has only 1 ), and * the 8th group in each half has only 2 s: 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 2 (= 12 + 18 = 30) 4 4 4 4 4 1 4 2 (= 12 + 15 = 27) A further condition is that in all these metres, * the odd-numbered (here, groups of 4 s) in each half are not LGL, and * the 6th group, in each half, is either L (if 1) or (if 4) LLLL or LGL. Various names ( , , ) and subdivisions, based on what is actually chosen where. Variable length. Praise of Sanskrit prosody find source and context for all these; flesh out * The "Prosody is easy and beautiful" says Sir William Jones. * The learned Chézy observes: "It is infinitely more rich and more ‍varied than that of Greek; and has no syllables of doubtful quantity." (C. P. Brown himself on p. 3: "All syllables are of a definite length, apparent to the eye; none are doubtful.") * Colebrooke (Essays, ii.62) ... "it is richer than that of any other language." Latest activity Category:Browse